THE EFFECT OF QUESTIONING ON YOUNG CHILDRENS MEMORY FOR AN EVENT

The effect of adult questioning on young children's memory for an event was examined. Three groups of 4- and 5-year-old children experienced two special events. The questioning group was then asked a set of questions about one of the events on four different occasions over a 7-week period. At the end of the 7 weeks, all children were tested for recall of the two events. The experience of answering questions enhanced the memory performance of the children in the questioning group. However, comparison of the performance of the questioning group with that of two control groups showed that their memory improvement was extremely specific: (a) The questioning group did better only on the specific questions they had been repeatedly asked, (b) There was no general enhancement of recall; they were no better on new questions about the same event, (c). The enhancement was not specific to the experience of retrieving information from long-term memory; the performance of a control group with no long-term memory demands was almost identical to that of the questioning group. The results of this study support the view that adult questioning of young children enhances memory for the specific information about which questions have been asked, but it does not have generalized effects on memory performance or development.